The rich grow richer

I was shocked when I got an email from Princeton a couple of weeks ago announcing a new fundraising drive. Old Nassau wants to raise $1.75 billion. That’s new money, folks. Hardly surprising, according to BusinessWeek.com (via Above the Law):

The $5.7 billion in investment gains generated by Harvard’s endowment for the year that ended June 30 exceeded the total endowment assets of all but six U.S. universities, five of which were Ivy Plus: Yale, Stanford, Princeton, MIT, and Columbia.

The article is probably wrong about how austerely earlier generations of Ivy Leaguers and their ilk lived — I wouldn’t say they did at all, based on contemporary standards, and in some respects they still lived better than today’s college kids. Through the ’80’s Williams College students still had their beds made for them by chambermaids.

Bob Millersaid

In late 1972, while we were taking an Army Ordnance Officer course at Aberdeen Proving Ground, MD, some of us were billeted down the road in the BOQ at Edgewood Arsenal. The BOQ was a replica of a motel of that era, complete with maid service taking care of cleaning, making the beds, etc. This earthly paradise I had never expected!